


brother wakes up in his little sister

by ShyAudacity



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, Archie Is a Good Friend, Asexual Jughead Jones, Beaches, Boys Kissing, Car Accidents, Crying, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dissociation, Hurt Jughead, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Nightmares, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Road Trips, Vomiting, Wakes & Funerals, at least in this fic he is, only slightly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-01
Updated: 2017-03-01
Packaged: 2018-09-27 17:53:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10037168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShyAudacity/pseuds/ShyAudacity
Summary: "I’m so sorry, she loved you so much.”He barely remembers hanging up the phone, very vaguely aware that he walked out of the diner without packing up his stuff.The next thing he knows, he’s standing outside the Andrews house; he’s out of breath and his face is wet. Archie opens the door looks at him funny, Jughead hasn’t cried in front of him since they were six and he broke his arm on the playground at school. But Jughead doesn’t care much about that right now because it feels like his lungs are trying to remove themselves from his chest.“My… my sister just died.” He croaks.“Oh, shit, Jug,” Archie says, his face falling. He grabs Jughead by the shoulder, pulling him in for a hug like he hasn’t done in god knows how long.ORJellybean dies and the boys finally go on their road trip.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Jughead is still asexual in this fic, but they do kiss. There's no set rules for being asexual, it's different for everyone who identifies themselves in that way. Title is from Eat Your Way Out by Bill Moran. Read on, my friends.
> 
> I do not give my permission to have this fic or any of my other works to be posted elsewhere on wattpad, fanfiction.net, etc.
> 
> EDIT: I wrote and posted this before episode seven came out, so that's why Jellybean her age is different from what it is canonically.

Everyone in Riverdale knows not to sit in Jughead’s booth at Pop’s. The only people allowed to sit there are his two closest friends, now three since Veronica Lodge and her mother moved to town. He has sat in the same booth for years refuses to sit anywhere else. So, when his father slides into the seat across from him on a gray day in September, he feels a sense of both curiosity and irritation.

“I need to talk to you.”

“I’m busy, come back later.” Jughead tells him, not once looking up from his computer.

“I got a phone call from your Uncle Walt.”

“I didn’t realize that you two were on speaking terms again.”

“Jug, this is important. Your mom and your sister were in an accident yesterday morning. Jellybean died, kid.”

His hands still over his keyboard, he kept his tone as calm as he could. “You’re lying.”

“I wouldn’t lie about this.”

“Yeah, well this wouldn’t be the first time you did something outlandish just to get me to do something in your favor.” Jughead looks up at his father, sitting in front of him with a grim look on his face. He’s seen his father look upset plenty of times before in his life, but something about this feels different; it’s unnerving to him.

“If you don’t believe me, then that’s fine, think what you want to.” The older man says, sliding out of the booth. “But you need to call your mom, Jughead, if not for your sake then for your sister’s. She deserves at least that much from you.”

Jughead sneered at him as he left, telling himself that he wasn’t going to do anything. He only lasted about five minutes before walking over to the pay phone that Pop kept in the back of the diner. It rang six times before his mom picked up. The two haven’t spoken to each other in over a year, but he’s too anxious to bother with a hello at this point.

_“Hello?”_

“Is Jellybean dead?”

_“Juggie? Is that you?”_

“Mom, just answer the question, is Jelly okay?”

 _“Oh honey, I’m so sorry.”_ She cries.

After that, everything is a bit of a blur. At some point, Jughead knows he heard his mom finally choke out the words, in a crying mess.

“ _I don’t know what happened she wasn’t wearing her seatbelt the guy hit us from behind it was so sudden, honey I couldn’t stop it. I’m so sorry, she loved you so much.”_

He barely remembers hanging up the phone, very vaguely aware that he walked out of the diner without packing up his stuff.

The next thing he knows, he’s standing outside the Andrews house; he’s out of breath and his face is wet. Archie opens the door looks at him funny, Jughead hasn’t cried in front of him since they were six and he broke his arm on the playground at school. But Jughead doesn’t care much about that right now because it feels like his lungs are trying to remove themselves from his chest.

“My… my sister just died.” He croaks.

“Oh, shit, Jug,” Archie says, his face falling. He grabs Jughead by the shoulder, pulling him in for a hug like he hasn’t done in god knows how long. Archie tightens his arms around his shoulders and his waist, just holding him together. Jughead cries loudly into his best friend’s neck, angry that he can’t bring himself to do anything else.

They move to the floor at some point. Jughead doesn’t remove his face from its hiding spot in Archie’s collarbone; he’s afraid to find out what will happen when he does. He’s long since stopped crying, but now he has this ache in his gut that seems to be growing by the minute. He wants so badly for this whole day to be one big nightmare.

“Let’s go upstairs, huh?” Archie asks, quietly.

Jughead nods, slowly removing himself from the hug and untangling their body parts.

They walk up to Archie’s room, and he forces Jughead under the covers right next to a sleeping Vegas.  

“I’ll be right back, okay? I promise.” Archie tells him, pulling out his phone as he exits the room.

Jughead spaces out the majority of the time that he’s gone, mindlessly petting Vegas all throughout. He thinks about how his dad knew where to find him. Then again nearly everyone in town knew where to find him. Everybody in Riverdale knows everybody else’s business; he wonders how many people already know about his sister, he wonders if anyone knew before he did. He doesn’t dwell on thought much longer because Archie is back, crouching in front of him.

“Do you feel like going on a road trip?”

 ***

They leave within the hour; it’s a sixteen-hour drive to Boston from Riverdale and the funeral is already scheduled for the day after next. Mr. Andrews assures the boys that he’ll inform the high school and work something out. Jughead watches from the front seat of the truck as Mr. Andrews palms Archie a wad of cash and wonders how he pulled it together so quickly.  

Archie drives them out of town, making sideways glances at Jughead every few miles who is trying to pretend that he hasn’t noticed. He makes it a point to put his feet up on the dash and pull his beanie down over his eyes. He doesn’t sleep, he lets his mind go back to last time him and his sister had been together before everything went wrong.

 ***

_Two of them were in the attic playing Texas Hold ‘Em, betting with their Halloween from the week before. They were trying to distract themselves from the knowledge that their parents were going to court the next morning to settle the custody agreement. The divorce had been messy and the whole town knew about it; Jughead and Jellybean had been unlucky enough to get caught in the middle of it all._

_“Do you think that we’re going to get split up?” A ten-year-old Jellybean asked, throwing a Reese’s peanut butter cup into the pile._

_At age twelve, Jughead already knew that his little was smarter than half the kids her age. He peered at her over his cards, contemplating what to say._

_“It’s a possibility,” he had told her. “If anything, the court is probably going to give Mom full custody. The justice system is weird about things like this, they don’t like separating kids from their mothers so they push for it in a lot of cases.”_

_“I know_ that _. I was just wondering if you think that they’re going to separate us.”_

_“Then no, Jelly, I don’t think that they’d split us up. I have a Full House, I win. Give me your Snickers.”_

 ***

When Jughead had gotten home from school the next day, his dad was the only one there. He beat himself up for years for giving his sister a false sense of hope. Now he’s driving across the country with his best friend to say goodbye to his little sister who he hadn’t seen in four years. He finds it to be unfair on so many levels.

“Jug? You good?” Archie asks, grabbing his attention.

Scoffing, he shakes his head. “Not even a little.”

The two of them don’t talk again until that night when they pull up to the hotel. It’s the only one on the map for another fifty miles, and they’re already tired after everything that had gone down that day. A woman checks them in for the night.

“It looks like the only available room right now is a king-sized on the second floor. Will that be a problem?” She asks. Before Archie can open his mouth and sputter out a protest, Jughead answers her.

“It’s fine,” he states. “We’re going to be asleep anyway.”

Archie shrugs, and they stalk off to their room. The two boys fall into the bed almost immediately, not even taking the time to get under the covers.

 ***

_Jughead is in the trunk of his family’s car. He doesn’t remember getting in, but he’s only ever in here when all of them are going to a movie at the drive-in. He can’t tell anyone that himself and Jellybean hide in the trunk or else they might get in trouble._

_He rolls over to ask her again what movie they’re going to, but he comes face to face with a paler, bloodied version of his sister. She opens her eyes and frowns at him._

_“You left me behind.”_

_“What?” he asks, puzzled as to why she looks the way she does._

_“You were supposed to come with me, Juggie. We were supposed to stay together.”_

He pulls himself out of the nightmare and gasps back into consciousness. Jughead is on his feet in seconds, stumbling his way to the bathroom. The light so bright that it hurts his eyes; he spills his guts into the toilet, heaving so hard that it hurts. He doesn’t even realize that he’s woken Archie up until he’s right behind him, trying to calm him down.

“You’re okay, Jug, you’re okay.” He says quietly, rubbing his back. “I got you.”

But he doesn’t feel okay because his sister died and they hadn’t spoken since her birthday last year, he hates himself for letting her slip away. It takes a while, but the heaving ceases and Archie pulls Jughead back against his chest; he sits up against the cupboard beneath the sink. Jughead finds himself crying again, this time more out of frustration than sadness.

They sit there until both of their legs go numb. Jughead rinses his mouth out with water, then pulls Archie back to the bed. He doesn’t stop himself from curling around the red head’s side, needing the physical contact. He rests his head-on Archie’s shoulder, sticking his nose into his collarbone just like he had so many hours before.

Subconsciously, he finds himself shifting more and more until he’s lying fully on Archie’s chest. They look at each other and Archie runs a hand over the back of his hat covered head.

“What are you thinking about?” He asks the raven-haired boy.

Jughead looks right at him, the only light coming from the moonlight peeking out of the sides of the curtains. In that moment, Jughead decides to do something that he’s been wanting to do for nearly a year. Jughead leans forward and kisses Archie square on the mouth. Archie kisses him back for only a second before pulling away.

“Jug, hold on, wait I-.” He tries.

“Please don’t stop me from doing this because I just lost my sister,” He whines. “Please, Arch, I need this, I need to feel something other than sad right now.”

Archie nods, a sympathetic look coming over his face. “Okay…okay, whatever you need.” Archie kisses him again, and Jughead finds a sense of relief overcoming him for what feels like the first time in forever.

 ***

They don’t do anything below the waist; Jughead is fairly he doesn’t want to do anything to that degree, at least not at this point in his life. They wake up in the morning, curled around each other and both of them sporting at least one hickey. They get breakfast and check out of the hotel before ten in the morning, ignoring the sly look they get from the worker who checked them in the night before.

“Give me the key’s, I’ll drive.” Jughead insists. Archie throws him the keys as he puts their bags in the back. Jughead gets into the front seat and remembers why they’re on this impromptu road trip in the first place, his hands shake when he lifts them to the ignition and they fall out of his hand. He bangs his head against the steering wheel.

Archie, having climbed into the front seat without Jughead realizing it, grabs the keys before he can try again.

“How about I drive for right now, okay?”

He nods, not in the mood to put up a fight. They trade places and don’t say much else to each other until they stop for lunch. Archie doesn’t complain once about driving the entire day, Jughead doesn’t know whether to thank him or call him out for not being honest.

The second day of driving is just like the first, but with slightly more touching. Archie will squeeze jughead’s shoulder to get his attention opposed to simply speaking. Jughead finds himself leaning against Archie while trying to decide what sandwich he wants when they stop for dinner that night.

Jughead gets an anxious feeling in his gut when they cross the state border into Massachusetts, Archie must sense this because he reaches over and rests his hand near his knee, tightening his grip for only a moment before focusing on the road again.

Pulling up the to their hotel, Archie is methodical in his thinking.

“Are you cool with sharing a king-sized bed again? We can try to get two queens if you really want to.”

“No, no we can share the bed. Besides, it’s nearly midnight, we’ll be lucky if this place even has a room open.” Jughead says, not meeting his eye.

He’s right, just like the night before, the hotel only has one available room with a king-sized bed. Archie goes straight for the bed, while Jughead goes for the shower. 

He stands there under the hot water with the shitty pressure and wonders if he should’ve have prepared something to say at the funeral in the morning. Jughead sends a silent plea to whoever is listening that his family, especially his mother, doesn’t ask him to give a eulogy. He can’t think of anything worth saying that would show everyone just how much he loved his sister, even if he hadn’t seen her in years.

Having made himself sad again, he towels off, puts on his sleep clothes then climbs into bed next to Archie. In his state of half lucidness, Archie throws an arm over his friend’s waist and pulls him to his chest. They stay like that the whole night, keeping each other safe the only way that they know how.

 ***

Jughead hates the universe more than ever. It’s a sunny day in Boston, and the weather is better than it’s been in Riverdale in months. Everything looks so joyous and he can’t stand it because _Jesus Christ my sister is dead doesn’t the world know that, don’t they care?_

They pull up to the cemetery, and the anxious feeling that he’d gotten the night before is back, only somehow worse. It makes him feel nauseous and empty all at once. Then, Archie puts his arm around his shoulders and it subsides just a little bit.

He pulls away when he sees his mom, going over to hug her. He’s glad to see her after all this time, he just wishes that it was under better circumstances. Jughead stands between his mother and Archie all throughout the service, only half listening to what the pastor is saying. He feels like he’s watching all of this happening from someone else’s point of view.

If she was there, Jellybean would have bugged him about why he was being all moody and emotional, would have coerced him into talking about it. But she’s not there, instead, she is and fourteen _and dead._ Jughead feels the familiar sensation of tears pricking behind his eyes and curses himself for doing this again.

He comes back to himself when he feels Archie press a kiss to his beanie covered head, and he realizes that the service is over. It dawns on him then that himself and Archie have a lot to talk about on the drive home, and even after that. They have fallen into a messy rhythm over the last two days, and a part of Jughead doesn’t want to let go of it.

They walk back the car, and he thinks of something that he’s wanted to do for years.

“Can we go to the beach?” Jughead asks.

Archie smiles at him from the driver’s seat. “Yeah, yeah that sounds great, Jug.”

They pull up a map and later find themselves at Revere Beach. The two of them trade out their funeral attire for a pair of shorts. Archie makes a break for the water as soon as he throws his door open. Jughead hangs back for a minute, letting the sand fill the space between his toes as he watches his friend flail around in the water.

They don’t stay more than an hour; they don’t need anybody questioning them as to why two teenage boys are at the beach in the middle of the day and not in school. Jughead and Archie both go back to the truck, covered in sand up to their knees and just barely sun-kissed. Piling in, they double check to make sure that they have everything that they came with.

“What next?” Archie asks. “Do you want to stick around and talk to somebody, your mom maybe?”

“No, I just want to go home,” Jughead tells him, looking at the sun setting behind the water. “I have some things that I need to figure out, and I can’t do that here.”

“What kind of things?”

He turns to look at Archie, the color of the sky behind him makes him glow. It’s like he’s being protected by a halo of light. Jughead doesn’t stop himself from leaning over the center console and kissing him. It’s quick, over much sooner than he’d like. He doesn’t have to worry if he’s made a mistake because when he pulls away Archie is grinning at him. The red head quickly dives back in for another kiss and Jughead knows that he made a good choice.

Archie sticks his hand under the edge of his beanie, scratching at the hairs there and pulling Jughead closer. He pulls away after a few minutes, still smiling like he’s just been gifted with everything he’s ever asked for.

Jughead feels a sense of peace replace the grief that had settled in between his lungs, and he doesn’t feel half as bad as he did when he woke up that morning. A voice in the back of his head is still there, reminding him that he doesn’t have a little sister anymore, but he ignores it as best he can.

As they take off down the highway back towards Riverdale, back to where everything is gray and everyone knows too much about everyone else, Jughead just watches Archie drive. Basks in the fact that he has him in his corner in a way that they didn’t before. He’s no longer mad about the fourth of July incident, he doesn’t care to know what his excuse is.

What he does know is the two of them have each other’s back. Right now, at a time like this, Jughead is certain that’s all that he needs.  

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, I really hope that you liked it. Please let me know what you thought of it, feedback is my only form of motivation. If you have a prompt(s), you can drop it here or at my tumblr dedicated to riverdale (thejugheadchronicles) and I'll see what I can do. Thanks again for reading, I hope you have a great day!


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